In the midst of this summer of discontent that the 2009 D’backs’ season, there is a glimmer of hope for the D’backs, a silver lining to Chris Young’s .174 batting average: If you sing semi-popular and outdated rock songs, they will come.

The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been the annual baseball summer concert series. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But the summer baseball concert series has marked the time. This field, this game; these semi-popular rock acts: they are a part of our past. They remind us of all that once was good and that it could be again. Oh… people will come, Ray. People will most definitely come.

So, I enjoyed a tasty meal of Americanized Chinese food at the PF Chang’s in Chandler last night. I was joined there, though at a separate table, by failing (failed?) DBacks reliever Jon Rauch. He of the 7.23 ERA, .313 opponents BA, and giver-upper of back-to-back RBI singles as part of the DBacks blowing a six-run lead in the 8th and 9th innings to lose on Monday. (more…)

If I had a personal secretary I’d tell her to mark the date – May 12, 2009- as the day the D-Backs season was saved. For this was the day the Diamondbacks promoted lefty pitcher Clay Zavada to the big leagues. Now I know very little about Zavada as a player, but a quick google search indicates that he’s apparently some sort of inspirational story because he never played above Low-A Ball until this year. Yet this is inconsequential to the facts at hand, my sweet SoD faithful. Zavada’s true strength is purely mustache related. As you can see by the picture on the left, Zavada has a mustache that I believe would be scientifically described as “wicked sweet.”

Bob Melvin has been fired. The firing should not be seen as an indictment of Melvin, but instead of GM Josh Byrnes.

Baseball managers can’t do much to help, or hurt, their team. Firing one is the easy way for a baseball front office to deflect blame away from the GM, scouts, and minor league system for team performance. But the real problem with supporting scape-goating the manager is that if improvement occurs, the idiots in the mainstream media will say “DBacks improve thanks to new manager,” because they are generally too stupid to realize that correlation is not causation.

If the DBacks improve, it will because the players play better. Playing ability is almost all talent; managers’ yelling won’t help you hit a curveball. Within a year or so of getting to the majors, you know what you’re going to get with most players, because minor league performance is generally a very accurate predictor of major league performance. So, anyone expecting huge breakout seasons from guys with three or more years in the league will be disappointed. Late career breakouts should arouse suspicion. The DBacks might have a little leeway as so many guys are 25 or below.

But fretting over the manager distracts from the real issue: talent on the field. Lack thereof goes to the front office, not the manager. Firing the manager should almost always be considered a mea culpa by the front office that they have been doing a bad job. Remember this.